The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is now requiring alternative investment fund managers to provide a lot more details on their operations.
The SEC unanimously approved the new documentation called Form PF, with minor concessions to alternative investment funds who complained the requirements would impose unnecessary costs.
The new documentation still requires the approval of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission,which is expected to come in a few days.
Under the SEC's original proposal, issued in January, all hedge fund and private equity firms with at least $1 billion in assets will be required to make the confidential disclosures quarterly. The threshold is now $1.5 million in assets for hedge fund managers and $2 billion for private equity funds.
All hedge and private equity fund firms with at least $150 million in assets will now be required to make some disclosures to the SEC. The information reported on Form PF would vary depending on the adviser.
Only the largest hedge funds and private equity funds will be subject to the most stringent disclosure requirements.
The largest firms — those with at least $5 billion in assets — will have to begin reporting after June 15 of next year. Smaller firms will begin making their disclosures after Dec. 15, 2012.
Hedge funds would test these thresholds daily, while private equity funds would test quarterly. These threshold tests are not applied on an individual fund level, but rather on an aggregate level of assets under management by the adviser.
